In post-detention KSFO interview, Corsi claimed critics of Obama are "now going to have to risk being thrown in jail or killed"

On KSFO's The Lee Rodgers Show, Jerome Corsi asserted regarding his detention and departure from Kenya: "I think the story here is really the suppression of the press. ... I hate to think of what the First Amendment is going to mean. If you write a negative book or criticize [Sen. Barack] Obama, I think you're now going to have to risk being thrown in jail or killed." Rodgers said, "I'll tell you what's scary about this, to make the connection here. These are friends of Barack Obama in Kenya, who are trying to intimidate a journalist."

On the October 9 edition of KSFO's The Lee Rodgers Show, Rodgers interviewed author Jerome Corsi, following Corsi's detention and eventual departure from Kenya, where he had reportedly been attempting to promote his book, The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality. During the interview, Corsi said of his detention: "I think the story here is really the suppression of the press. ... I hate to think of what the First Amendment is going to mean. If you write a negative book or criticize [Sen. Barack] Obama, I think you're now going to have to risk being thrown in jail or killed." Rodgers replied: "Yeah, well, that's the mentality of these people." Earlier in the interview, Rodgers said to Corsi: "Kenya used to be a nice country, but I'll tell you -- I'll tell you what's scary about this, to make the connection here. These are friends of Barack Obama in Kenya, who are trying to intimidate a journalist. ... I'm telling you, this is scary. I have heard from Obama supporters telling me: one way or another, boy, when we're in office, we're going to shut you down."

Corsi claimed on the October 7 broadcast of The War Room with Quinn & Rose that he was being detained in Kenya because immigration had lost his entry papers, but other mediaoutlets reported that, according to immigration officials, Corsi was detained because he attempted to conduct business without a work permit.

During the October 9 edition of Rodgers' program, Corsi also claimed that Obama "campaigned with" Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga during a 2006 trip to Kenya, when Odinga was challenging incumbent Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki. However, according to an August 20 PolitiFact.com article, that assertion -- which Corsi also made in The Obama Nation -- is false. PolitiFact.com wrote that it "scour[ed] the public record for evidence that Obama supported Odinga" and concluded that Obama "has remained neutral in Kenyan politics, and did not support Odinga during his trip." PolitiFact.com concluded: "Corsi states that Obama 'openly supported' Raila Odinga. We found public statements from Obama during the trip saying the exact opposite. We found no other evidence to support Corsi's statement, so we rate his statement False."

Additionally, Corsi falsely claimed on The Lee Rodgers Show that he "[d]isproved every point" that the Obama campaign made in a "40-page rebuttal" to his book. In fact, as Media Matters for America has noted, after the Obama campaign released the document to which Corsi referred -- which debunked numerous falsehoods in Corsi's book -- Corsi provided a list of 11 "corrections to the next printing of The Obama Nation," many of which correct falsehoods that were identified by the Obama campaign, Media Matters, or both.

As Media Mattershas noted, Corsi has repeatedly suggested that the Obama campaign is attempting to censor him. On the October 7 edition of The War Room with Quinn & Rose, Corsi suggested that Obama was responsible for his detention in Kenya, stating at one point: "[J]ust don't write anything bad about Senator Obama, because, otherwise, this is what happens to you." He previously questioned whether "an Obama administration might have a censorship department in which a book critical of a President Obama might be banned from publication," and said that if Obama were elected president and someone were to write a book critical of him, "Obama might just have to create a department of hate crimes and put them in jail." As Media Mattershas noted, in appearances on C-SPAN and othermediaoutlets, Corsi has promoted the falsehoods in his book even though they have been widely discredited.

From the October 9 broadcast of KSFO's The Lee Rodgers Show:

RODGERS: Kenya used to be a nice country, but I'll tell you -- I'll tell you what's scary about this, to make the connection here. These are friends of Barack Obama in Kenya who are trying to intimidate a journalist.

CORSI: Right.

RODGERS: In this country, the Obama campaign has tried to intimidate TV stations in Pennsylvania into not running commercials bought and paid for by John McCain's campaign, and his thugs in Chicago have tried to intimidate WGN radio from interviewing people who know some unpleasant things about Senator Obama. I'm telling you, this is scary. I have heard from Obama supporters telling me in one way or another, "Boy, when we're in office, we're gonna shut you down." This is the mentality of these people.

CORSI: Well, that's right. And look, Chapter Five -- Chapter Four of my book, The Obama Nation -- this whole Kenyan story I told is absolutely true. Obama went out of his way -- and now I've even got the government videos asking Obama to leave the country for interfering in their politics in 2006, when he's over there in the Senate visiting, campaigned with Odinga, and Odinga showing up everywhere Obama was. The Obama campaign called me a liar, but they don't -- then they don't -- I wrote a rejoinder -- you know, they wrote this 40-page rebuttal, saying my book was unfit to publish. I wrote a 50-page rejoinder to it. Disproved every point that they made, showing how bad their arguments were. They never answered me, but yet they call me the liar. You know, everything I wrote -- if you read The Obama Nation, Lee, you'll see --

RODGERS: I have.

CORSI: -- why they don't want it read, 'cause what I'm saying is the truth. They've called me -- you know, they tell me I'm a hack writer, and I'm a smear artist. Anything you say that's negative to Obama, they say it's racist, it's a smear --

RODGERS: Like using his middle name, for example.

CORSI: True. That is his -- Hussein is his middle name. I mean, you know, it's not smearing him to point out his middle name. And in my book, what I do is I very carefully documented -- I've got about 700 footnotes in the book, and, of course, they want to ridicule the footnotes. You know, but the Obama campaign is using the Saul Alinsky tactics. Obama was trained by Saul Alinsky -- an organization -- Saul Alinsky's "Rules for Radicals" said ridicule your opponents and call them names. Do everything you can to make people not listen to them. I'm telling the truth in The Obama Nation, and if people read the book, they'll see that it's true.

RODGERS: So, you're out now, you're in London. I would assume you have no plans for a return visit to Kenya, which is too bad. The beaches down at Mombasa are very nice -- very nice, indeed.

CORSI: Mombasa's beautiful.

RODGERS: But when are you coming back to the US of A? Are you going to be back in time for the election, or what?

CORSI: Yes, Lee. I'll be back on -- I'll be back on Saturday. The first television --Hannity & Colmes has me on tonight at 9 o'clock. I'll be doing it from London. It'll be the middle of the night here in London. That'll be the first TV since I was, you know, detained and thrown out of Kenya. And I think the story here, really, is the suppression of the press. You're exactly right. I hate to think of what the First Amendment is going to mean. If you write a negative book or criticize Obama, I think you're now going to have to risk being thrown in jail or killed.

RODGERS: Yeah, well, that's the mentality of these -- of these people. And I would assume we could tell everyone that they can read a full account of your vacation in Kenya at WorldNetDaily.com?

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